By DUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
McALLEN, Texas |...A discernible wave of sympathy blew across the country over the weekend after extremist Republican Donald J. Trump was shot at a rally in Pennsylvania. It was a bit over-the-top for a man who has done his damndest to divide the country.
Yes, weep one more time for civility.
But don't shed another tear for Trump. He has known what he's been doing in becoming the most divisive presidential candidate ever. I mean, serious candidate, not some outlier like Lyndon LaRouche or David Duke or even George Wallace.
Donald J. Trump remains the biggest threat to American Life.
Let his wife and children and most rabid supporters normalize him. The rest of us cannot.
This election in November is up for grabs and it pains me to write that, knowing of course all that Donald Trump has let loose in our national discourse and streets. There are armed nutjobs out there, as he found out last Saturday afternoon. It cost him as piece of his ear, but it could have been much worse.
This is a flawed, unbridled candidate who began his political journey by calling Mexicans "rapists" and then proceeded to tear down much of what we call these United States. Trump wants to be president in the worst ways. He moaned about dark-skinned immigrants and banned Muslims from entering the country while occupying the White House between 2016 and 2021 - a time in America still to be written about by historians.
As many have written, Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election he lost to Joe Biden an action for which he has been indicted and is facing multiple felony counts. He's called for ridding the country of the Constitution, writing on his Truth Social media that a massive fraud "allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution."
And, as we also know, Trump has said he would be a dictator if elected, but only on "Day One."
Trump is not well. His vision for this country is one at odds with the rest of us. Separating people is his aim, only that approach hurts and damages too many Americans. His world is the world of Red States versus Blue States - perhaps itself a Civil War of sorts.
No, don't waste your sympathies on this guy.
He's the one who laughed and mocked the beating of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband in his own home by a hammer-wielding attacker. Trump knows no bounds on his complaints and criticism of how we live in this country. His legal problems are many and there are those who say his campaign is nothing more than an effort to stay out of prison.
Three criminal trials hang around his hefty neck. He's dog-paddling while Lady Justice waits for her chance at him. He knows. He knows a defeat in November against Democrat incumbent Joe Biden will open the gates of prosecutorial Hell.
But there he stands at his rallies, damning the president and our way of Life.
The country he wants is already taken. A killing dude named Putin owns it across the Atlantic.
No, don't waste your breath on Donald J. Trump.
He may have lost a small piece of his right ear, but his body of work remains.
You watch.
The Republican National Convention begins today in Milwaukee. Wild applause awaits him from a sector of America that has no idea about wishing for something and getting something else.
Callous, selfish Republicans set to speak during the event will ignore his harsh rhetoric and damn Democrats, actually blame them for the assassination attempt. Without laughing.
Trump will milk the moment for all it's worth, take is many bows and feel as if he's already won the presidency. Indeed, he likely believes he is invincible, undefeated and undeterred. The other 700-pages in his book tell a very different story.
Trump is bad, mean, desperate and, worse than that, feeling cornered...
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